Video: The Very Necessary Stop-Motion Re-Creation of the ’80s TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles Theme

Animated ’80s television series Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was amazing. Even if it’s difficult to remember details without consulting YouTube, one thing sticks with you: that extremely catchy theme song, re-created in an awesome new stop-motion video.

“As a Turtle fan as a kid I had always wanted to create a stop-motion with them,” the clip’s director, Kyle Roberts, said in an e-mail to Wired. “Figured what better way to do a tribute video than the theme everyone remembers.”

Roberts went to Oklahoma City surf punk outfit The Boom Bang for an original take on the song that proves just as addictive as the original. (Download the cover at left.) But to create the video, embedded below, Roberts went to entirely different lengths.

Fueled by sleep-deprivation and Turtle Power, Roberts made the stop-motion clip using 4,000 individual pictures of action figures. Artist Nathan Poppe (that’s him in the beginning of the video chugging coffee) drew more than 60 images to serve as the Magic Marker-looking city backdrops in the video. Donatello, Raphael, Michelangelo and Leonardo were then filmed in front of a blue screen (they couldn’t be filmed on green screen because they’re, well, green) to get the action down.

“Everyone involved with this project were/are all huge TMNT fans,” Roberts said. “My first concert (age 5) was a TMNT concert. It was a traveling rock concert/show called “Coming Out of Their Shells” — [It] was totally ridiculous and awesome!”

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